"Help Strata!" Zariel shouted to Liam as she stepped between him and the beserker.

Liam looked at the unmoving blue armored boy, and the electric whip wielding demon who would not make things easy. The black thing was moving the whip back and forth, keeping it in motion, ready to strike. He looked back. Zariel was engaged with the woman, and unlike with the soldiers, she was kept very busy. Past the girls, the big one was lumbering towards them all. Liam swallowed. Hard. Again, he considered the option to leave. He mentally shook his head. No. He couldn't do that. With trembling hands, he grabbed two swords, still wondering why he carried six. He had people counting on him now, and that could not be ignored.

The black thing made the whip hiss, sending electricity crackling down its length, then cracked it in Liam's direction, making him cringe at the thought of what it would feel like to get hit. "Come on!" It growled, stepping forward. It's short, hunched, fluid yet lurching movements were fascinating.

Was it safe to touch the whip with the swords? Or would any contact send painful lightening streaking through his body? Should he try to avoid him, run past to retrieve the fallen one? Try to destroy it? Liam shifted his gaze between the two of them.

"Get him, Horil!" The beserker shouted, then went back to yelling at Zariel.

The thing zipped forward, snapping the whip, cracking it against Liam's chest. Tingling, sharp, numbing sensations flooded across the boy, making him cry out and stagger backwards, but he kept his feet. Horil reached out again, and it set Liam's nerves screaming.

His breath in short gasps, Liam ran backwards, trying to escape the whip. It came at him again, and he tried to swipe it away with a sword. The blade was still conductive, and it carried the current fully. But the thing across from him howled in fury, and Liam saw the tip of the whip smolder, and split. He could destroy it! But another jolt had him convinced he couldn't take much more. The strange, eery pain was unbearable in its unique intensity. It made his head swim, and his teeth ache.

He noticed the whip itself wasn't always electrified, its presence seemed either random or at the will of its master. Was there some way to use that? Six swords, what for? Liam tried to focus. The ground still tremored beneath him as the giant came closer, and he could still hear the women, sometimes one of them would get hurt, but he couldn't look. His hands stopped trembling as he breathed more deeply. His head hurt as he tried to think. Think! The whip arched toward him again, but he stepped aside. Right now, he had to avoid it if he could. That task became harder as his evasion frustrated the black thing.

Horil sent the whip sizzling through the air, weaving it about, causing it to dance in ways any top rate performer would envy. It was fast. Liam tried to keep from letting it bite him, but when he dodged one way, it seemed to track him and punish his efforts. Soon, Liam just wanted it to stop. Stop, stop! He wanted to beg, but he knew it would do no good, and to stop trying would only invite more, worse, of the same. He remembered his father, and how he had fought against the odds, how he had struggled against the mutation in his cells. Perhaps his father had ultimately lost the battle, but he had managed to live an entire two years longer than the most optimistic predictions.

Grit. The word slipped from some obscure, dusty corner. His dad had grit. His mother did, too, as she had unwaveringly supported them all through the hardest experience that had ever befallen them. He did not have to be experienced to endure.

He couldn't help the yell that escaped him as the whip found him again, touching his arm as he tried to turn, and seizing up his whole body. He stumbled, falling to his hands and knees. He saw more of the Youja joining the fight, and turned in alarm to see if Strata was still okay. The dark blue armor was gone. Apparently he had regained consciousness. So where was he? Liam hoped he was going to help out, and soon. Turning his head the other way, he was dismayed to see Zariel was now facing both the berserker and the giant, with enemy soldiers closing around her, as well. She seemed to be literally weakening, slowing. The whip cracked against his back. The Youja came closer.

An arrow whistled through the air, catching one of the green armored soldiers. Liam brightened as it brought another one down, and drew Horil's attention to a building several stories above them. Strata had broken into a window high in an office building, moving from window to window to take his shots. Light caught weakly on each arrow as it was loosed, catching the eye. His covering fire moved to assist Zariel, and Liam took the moment to gain his feet.

Liam looked around, and thought this battle would not end in their favor. Accordingly, he saw only one thing to do. Strata's arrows had indeed aided Zariel, but she was barely keeping her feet now, and every hit from the berserker woman knocked her around, and each swing of the giant's axe looked like it could deliver a death blow if it caught her. He didn't stop to wonder what could have wrought that change in the strong young woman.

He whistled to bring the demon's attention back to him, and when Horil turned it's eyeless face to him, Liam threw a sword at it. Hissing, it drew aside at the last moment, startled. Liam was running past him, drawing another of the swords, and slicing through the Youja. Black smoke drifted up from each that he hit solidly, and he made it to Cruelty.

As soon as he got close to her, he immediately felt drained, weak, despite how hard his heart was hammering in his deathly frightened chest. The effect was confusing. His limbs were hard to move, breathing became hard, and he simply felt, dull. And the effect became stronger the longer he was there. Whatever caused it, it was clear this was the reason Zariel was doing poorly. More arrows rained around him, pelting the giant and the beserker. It seemed to annoy the woman, but had no effect on the giant. The axe came down at him, and he instinctively lurched backwards from it, the edge slicing the air in front of his face and sinking into the road at his feet.

Now! He grabbed Zariel, the extra weight causing him to stumble weakly. Running seemed laughable, but he tried to move at a speed above an unsteady walk away from these attackers. The beserker shouted at him furiously, her unmanageable anger seeming to leave her unable to decide where to unleash it, simply lashing around her in blind fury as Strata's arrows pricked and clattered around her.

Finally, Liam made it away from whatever it was that was causing his strength to evaporate, and shaky but better, he made it towards the office Strata had commandeered. The archer was beginning to have troubles of his own, as enemy bowmen targeted his shifting position. As the arrows got close to him, he descended, meeting Liam on the ground floor. Zariel was on her feet, but swaying. Liam could feel something from her, but wasn't sure what. She did not look healthy.

"Where do we go?" Strata said.

His accent sounded different to Liam's ears than the American's did. It was closer to his own. English?

"We have to find somewhere to hide," Liam said unnecessarily, flinching as he heard the enemy getting closer.

"Split up," Zariel said, supporting herself. "Lose them. We can meet up in the Museums."

"I know where the Museum of Natural History is," Liam replied, excited. "My Mom took me there just a couple of weeks ago."

Strata groaned. "I just found my way out of there."

"Any other suggestions?" Zariel asked grimly as the Youja burst through the door, led by the beserker woman.

"First exhibit in the left wing!" Liam shouted, moving in close to the enemy before veering away, taking a large portion of the group with him. Strata was fleeing away from all of them, taking the clearest route.

Zariel broke off the opposite of Liam, and was forming her plan to shake them off her tail. She had been cut several times by the beserker's strange clubs, and had barely escaped the giant without serious injury, but something was not right in her body. Examining the symptoms she was afraid were not fully developed, she was fast becoming convinced some foreign agent was responsible. The further she went, the more she leaned towards poison. It would explain the staining on the ends of the other woman's weapons. It was slowing her down, keeping her from losing the howling maniacs trailing her as quickly as she had hoped. It wasn't the same thing that had drained her energy earlier, but she was starting to feel weak. The running was making it course through her system all the faster, sped on by the adrenaline her glands were pumping out.

She turned a corner, knowing they saw her do it, and tried to climb up the wall to a short ledge she had barely noticed. It was recessed, and it had only been a lucky glance as she turned the corner that had let her see it. Directly below it like this, she couldn't see it at all. In a moment she had heaved herself onto the ledge, relieved to see it was deeper than she had hoped. Lying as flat as she possibly could, she heard the enemy turn the corner and stop. It had almost taken her too long.

"She must have gone up," the berserker growled.

"I don't see her any where," a metallic voice dared to speak.

"There's no where for her to hide, Torig," Another added.

"Aa-urrrgh!" The berserker roared. "She can't be far, split up! Find her!"

"Does it matter?" Another scoffed. "I see blood on your clubs. She's done for."

There was a wordless noise, a scrape, and a cry. "Lord Talpa wants confirmed results, fool! We must find her body, if nothing else. Get out of my sight before I kill the rest of you!"

They sounded to practically run each other over to comply with her order. Zariel waited a long moment, trying to be sure they had all left. She felt feverish, her breathing was labored, and sweat trickled down her face. She was about to move when she realized that she was not sure if the berserker, Torig, had left as well. Was she still down there, waiting for Zariel to betray herself? She practically held her breath, listening.

A moment later came a low growl, and the woman seemed to walk around the building, choosing a different side to climb up. Zariel knew it would be hard to move before long, making her desperate to escape her situation, but she had to wait until they had all left. She heard Torig gain the top, thumping around angrily on the empty roof. Zariel held her breath. If the woman looked over the edge, she would be spotted for sure. With a verbal cry of rage, Torig jumped off the opposite side of the building and ran grumbling and growling away.

Zariel sighed. Lying there a minute longer, she tried to place where she was in the city. She had moved across from the museum. She hadn't dared lead a direct path, but had positioned herself so she could cut across a relatively short distance. It seemed despairingly far as she oriented herself. It had to be almost a mile away. No distance at all for a healthy person, but she was clearly not well.

Had her great-grand dad ever felt anything like this? Hard to say. It was possible, but maybe it had been easy for him. Would Mom have liked to see the view from here? If the dark clouds would go away and let the sun shine? It was probably a good thing the sun wasn't shining right now, that would be really hot. Kind of like when they would open the oven door when she had helped Mom with making cookies or pies. Her stomach felt so queasy and knotted that the memory of her mom's strawberry rhubarb pie brought the wrong kind of water to her mouth.

She realized with a start that her mind was wandering too far from where it should be. Was she becoming delirious? Why wasn't she standing? She rolled over, and with a short cry, fell off the ledge, landing with a dull thud on the ground below. She didn't want to move, it took too much effort. But it was move or die here. Museum. She had to make it to the museum.

Zariel managed to pull herself to her feet, but the painful fire in her body had her hunched over, nauseated and miserable. One step, she tried to tell herself as she put a foot forward. That's all she needed. One step. One step. Fortunately, she did not see any of the enemy, certainly from luck more than any intention. After what seemed a standing eternity, she came within sight of the large, old looking and impressive building front that marked the Museum of Natural History. That was when her feet gave out, and she was reduced to crawling. At some point, still trying to pull herself to safety, her world went dark.

AN: Okay, I'll admit, I've never been to the Museum. It sounds really neat, though, and I would like to go some day. In my defense, this is in the future, it's probably not the same as it is now. :P